Which Two Heads Are Better Than One: How diverse teams create breakthrough ideas and make smarter decisions. Inclusive leadership is a critical capability to leverage diverse thinking in a workforce with increasingly diverse markets, customers, and talent. If you’ve ever said, “I was unofficially doing the job for two years before they promoted me,” you’ve worked in this kind of company. One place to start is to make a conscious effort to part ways with the egotism that runs rampant in corporate environments. How can leaders put these insights into practice? For example, while Thomas Frist was leading Hospital Corporation of America, physical therapists would sometimes become senior executives simply because Frist saw something that others didn’t. First, hire for talent, not a resume. From this research, we identified 17 discrete sets of behaviors, which we grouped into six categories (or “traits”), all of which are equally important and mutually reinforcing. These trusted advisers can give leaders granular feedback on everyday interpersonal behaviors that support or inhibit inclusion, for example: Does the leader give equal time to all meeting participants, or favor those who are co-located over those who have dialed in? So we believe that companies need to consider how inclusive leadership, as well as the broader principles of diversity and inclusion fit within the organization, innovation strategy and processes. By being both intensive and nurturing, this kind of culture fosters an “us against the world” mentality that drives high performance and inclusiveness. Go try something…’ It was very empowering because it gave you a license to say, ‘We can do some things differently!’” Unlike their more conventional peers, inclusive leaders believe it’s “innovate or die,” and the only way to stay alive is to set aside their assumptions and fears and welcome good ideas from everywhere. For those working around a leader, such as a manager, direct report or peer, the single most important trait generating a sense of inclusiveness is a leader’s visible awareness of bias. If you practice curiosity and courageousness, and then incorporate the management behaviors described here, you’ll increase your odds of becoming an inclusive leader and building a high-performance, high-growth organization. She is the author of Which Two Heads Are Better Than One: How diverse teams create breakthrough ideas and make smarter decisions. These are the six traits or behaviors that we found distinguish inclusive leaders from others: Visible commitment: They articulate authentic commitment to diversity, challenge the status quo, hold others accountable and make diversity and inclusion a personal priority. Twitter: @sydfinkelstein. This requires effort, but fortunately the circle of learning is virtuous. Everything else her staff might have wanted to try was open to negotiation. Awareness of bias: They show awareness of personal blind spots as well as flaws in the system and work hard to ensure meritocracy. First, most leaders in the study were unsure about whether others experienced them as inclusive or not. Inclusive leaders do — and in a fairly unique way. Inclusive leaders don’t hire the way managers traditionally do, hewing to some established formula for assessing a recruit’s desired credentials or background. These are the behaviors: visible commitment, humility, awareness of bias, curiosity about others, cultural intelligence, and effective collaboration. Inclusive leadership is emerging as a unique and critical capability helping organisations adapt to diverse customers, markets, ideas and talent. By being both intensive and nurturing, this kind of culture helps sustain an insider mentality on the team. Companies increasingly rely on diverse, multidisciplinary teams that combine the collective capabilities of women and men, people of different cultural heritage, and younger and older workers. To underscore this insight: Our analysis of the 360-degree Inclusive Leadership Assessments (ILA) of more than 400 leaders made by almost 4,000 raters reveals that while all six traits are important and operate as a cluster, a leader’s awareness of personal and organizational biases is the number one factor that raters care most about. What specific actions can leaders take to be more inclusive? Harvard Business Publishing is an affiliate of Harvard Business School. By definition, inclusive leaders embrace the notion that every person counts. Inclusive leadership is a critical capability to leverage diverse thinking in a workforce with increasingly diverse markets, customers, and talent. 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